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Home > Opinion > Mike Luckovich > Archives > 2006 > March > 07
Tuesday, March 7, 2006
What civil war?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Permalink | Comments (481) | Categories: Editorial Cartoon
REMEMBER DANIELLE?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
a while back, i did a cartoon in which i wrote all two thousand names of the u.s. soldiers who had been killed in iraq at that point, spelling out the letters “WHY.” a few weeks later, a young women named danielle responded using the names and spelling out “FREEDOM.” she has sent me a story about problems she’s been having with the georgia justice system following a traffic accident. . i’ll post danielle’s account of how everything turns out for her later. this, in her own words, is what has happened so far-
On an afternoon in September 2005 I was driving home from school. As I came upon a curve I had just checked my speed and I was running 45 mph in a 45 zone. As I come a round the curve a MACK Truck turns left and enters my lane. I slammed on the horn and onto the brakes, but my brakes locked, and there was no way to turn from hitting head on, luckily though no one was hurt. The police were called to the scene, and once an officer arrived he walked off the skid marks, and I watched, he took gigantic steps and walked up each skid mark. The officer said he wasn’t going to wait around all day for the people he called the distances in to call back and tell how fast I had been going. The officer handed me a sheet of paper and on it said I had a court date for October 28, and he also took down my home number so that he could call and let us know how fast I was running that weekend. He called and said I was running 63 mph, he talked to my father, he said that there was 167 feet of skid marks that he walked off. My father said “No way. I want to see it measured and figured” the officer replied “I don’t have too”. Dad said “No but it wont look good when I get up in court and tell about your attitude.” Later that morning the officer called and spoke with my dad saying that they would be at the scene of the wreck in 15 minutes to measure and figure the skid marks. We don’t live five minutes from the scene. My dad left right then and when he got there they said they had already measured and figured, but they didn’t have anything in their hands to measure it with. They said that it was 132’ and 139’ of marks, and that I was running approximately 53 mph in a 45 mph zone. We had measured them off also with a measuring tape, and came up with 106’ and 112’ of skid marks on the day of the wreck and also took pictures of the scene. The court date on the slip of paper that said October 26 and court case number 2005 029944, came up and Dad missed a day of work and I missed a day of school. Once we were there we were told that I didn’t have an actual court date yet, and that I wouldn’t even be tried there because that was not juvenile court. Then next court date given to us by the officer was December 28 and it was to be down town Atlanta. Once again Dad and I went, once we were there, we found out that where we were sent was the criminal court room, and that I once again did not have a court date, and that also I would not be tried there. Then February 7th we had a court date with juvenile traffic court, once we were there, we were told we had a continuance because the officer had called in on vacation. We waited three and a half hours to be told that we had to come back next month. We did learn one thing at the February trial though the man that hit me is a cop in another county, we found out because he complained about having to miss _ a day of work, when that was our third time and he had not shown up at any of the others. Tomorrow (March 7, 2006) is the next court date, and it shall be interesting to see it’s out come.
Danielle
